Hwoarang (Hangul: 화랑; Hanja: 花郎 Hwarang; Japanese: ファラン Faran) is a character in the Tekken series who first appeared in Tekken 3 and has returned in all subsequent games. He is the Taekwondo student of Baek Doo San, and entered the third Tournament to get revenge on Ogre for "killing" his master. He has also become Jin Kazama's rival after the two fought to a draw in one of Hwoarang's street matches before the events of Tekken 3.

Contents

Biography

Personality

Hwoarang is a hot-headed, impulsive person who enjoys fighting. He is sometimes arrogant and brash as he likes to boast about his skills and strength. He still holds his focus on his opponents to not lose himself in his pride. He is very rebellious and does not like to obey orders, but this changes in regard to his master, Baek, whom he dearly respects. Hwoarang tends to hold a grudge towards his enemies, and he has a strong sense of determination to fight his rivals, especially Jin Kazama.

Throughout the Scenario Campaign, most characters will chide Hwoarang for his impulsive behavior in persisting in a futile fight, while a few, such as Wang and Mokujin, offer a more optimistic view of his strong spirit despite his cause being doomed. Alisa later mentions her doubts about the Resistance's success as Hwoarang was more focused on his personal matter with Jin than actually saving the world.

Outfits

Story

Hwoarang entered this tournament after Ogre attacked his mentor Baek, who Hwoarang respects greatly. He wanted to redeem himself by taking revenge against Ogre and defeating Jin Kazama, (Hwoarang failed to beat in a previous fight).[3]

Official Version

A student of Taekwondo who works out at Baek Doo San's dojo, Hwoarang makes a lot of money through dishonest gambling wagers. As part of what's called a fraud team, he and other members pick fights for money. They manipulate the odds by concealing their true strength. Hwoarang escalates the odds against him and makes what appears to be a foolish wager. His opponents soon realize they're the real fools when Hwoarang soundly beats each and every one of them.

One day, members of the Mishima Group came to town, including among them Jin Kazama. Hwoarang talks them into his game and is matched against Jin. Hwoarang embarrassingly can only manage a draw. He hangs his head in disbelief at the first blemish in his perfect career. Sickened at the thought of having to tell his teacher, Baek, the bad news, Hwoarang vows to practice every day to guarantee that it would never happen again. Then, terrible news — Ogre claims Baek as yet another victim.

Hwoarang now has a purpose in life. He will participate in the tournament, beat Jin Kazama and seek revenge against the God of Fighting: Ogre.[4]

Hwoarang ending tekken 3

TK3 Ending

Ending Description, "Rival": Hwoarang is sitting down at an alleyway, holding a trophy (that is a gold version of Heihachi's head). He is ready to toss it away when he notices a wounded Jin being pursued by the Tekken Force. Jin is then cornered by the soldiers. As a distraction, Hwoarang throws the trophy into the area, and then beats up the Tekken Force. When he turns to face Jin, he is already transforming into Devil Jin and leaps out of the warehouse. Hwoarang smiles as he trembles with excitement.

Prologue Text (Western Version):Back in his homeland of Korea, Hwoarang was drafted into the military and assigned to a SpecOps unit. Although his success in various missions were highly regarded, his penchant for disobeying rules and orders gave his senior officers more than a few headaches. Hwoarang felt a strange emptiness within him. He recalled longingly of the days hustling money in street fights, the rush from hand-to-hand combat, and his fight against Jin Kazama. The military could not quell these yearnings.

One day, the announcement of the next Tournament reached Hwoarang's ears. For the first time in years, his blood began to stir. He would defeat Jin, Heihachi Mishima, and anyone else who dared to stand in his way of claiming Mishima Zaibatsu as his own.

Bursting with anticipation, Hwoarang slipped out from the military base and headed for the Tournament.[5]

Prologue Text (Japanese version):Hwoarang was drafted into the military back in his homeland of Korea and was assigned to a special operations division. Although his successes in various missions were highly regarded along with his prowess at Tae Kwon Do and combat techniques, his penchant for disobeying rules and orders gave his senior officers more than a few headaches.

Hwoarang was uninterested in military life and felt a strange emptiness within him. He longingly recalled the days of hustling money in street fights and the rush he experienced from hand-to-hand combat. He often thought of one fight in particular ...the fight against Jin Kazama. These longings could not be quelled by the military.

One day, Hwoarang found out about the announcement of the next Tournament. Hwoarang's blood stirred. He would defeat Jin, Heihachi Mishima, and anyone else who dared to challenge him to claim the Mishima Zaibatsu.

Filled with excitement he hasn't felt in years, Hwoarang slipped out from the military base and headed for the Tournament.[6][7]

Hwoarang ending tekken 4

TK4 Ending

Ending Description: Hwoarang has finally been able to meet Jin in a parking lot. "You're finally here." he says as Jin approaches. "So, what do you want?" asks an indifferent Jin. Hwoarang replies, "I never got to fight you at the tournament. I'll take you on right here, right now." However, Jin replies back, "There is no reason to fight." Hwoarang doesn't back down, and begins to fight him anyway. After the battle, Hwoarang's Korean commander steps in, as well as other South Korean military officials, ordering Hwoarang to surrender himself for court-martial for dereliction of duty. Then Jin steps in, knocking out a few of the guards. Hwoarang joins in, and the two run away, with Hwoarang concluding that he would let him, so as to even the score at the next tournament.

The South Korean Army arrested and took Hwoarang into custody during the last round of the King of Iron Fist Tournament 4, keeping him from his long-awaited fight with Jin Kazama. Two months later, he was discharged from military service. With nothing holding him back, Hwoarang is free to pursue a confrontation with Jin Kazama.

Official Version

Taekwondo Ace and rival of Jin Kazama, Hwoarang.

Hwoarang was taken into custody by the South Korean military during the last round of The King of Iron Fist Tournament 4, keeping him from his long awaited fight with rival Jin Kazama.

At the Korean embassy, a man claiming to be an ambassador passed him a letter, "I received this letter for you from the military. Take a look!"

Hwoarang could not believe his eyes.

Hwoarang is discharged from the South Korean military a couple of months later. Free from military duty, Hwoarang seizes the opportunity to pursue Jin Kazama and finally battle him face-to-face.

Ending Description:

Tekken 5 Hwoarang Ending

TK5 Ending

Hwoarang is riding a motorcycle at an increased speed. "This sucks!", Hwoarang yells. Soon, he notices something in his way. The figure is Devil Jin. He then attempts to hit the brakes. Before he can successfully stop, Devil Jin lifts his hand and causes Hwoarang's motorcycle to explode. Devil Jin slowly walks towards an injured Hwoarang with the fiery explosion behind him. Hwoarang then yells "You stupid...Come on!" while staggering to stand up and preparing his fighting stance in a weakened state. The scene then ends with Hwoarang making a determined facial expression.

In The King of Iron Fist Tournament 5, Hwoarang faced Jin and defeated him. While Jin was lying on the ground, suddenly, he roars paranormally and produces a gale that blows Hwoarang away. From Jin's back, two black wings spread, and Jin stands up in his devil form. Hwoarang is at his wits end. He is not able to fight back, and soon he is knocked unconscious. When Hwoarang wakes up, he finds himself in the hospital. Nearby, he sees Baek standing as a visitor. Hwoarang hears the details from Baek. He ignores his nurse and tries to move from his bed. He falls down in order to beseech Baek to make him stronger. After leaving the hospital, Hwoarang starts training with unprecedented devoutness in order to defeat the "paranormal" Jin. Thus, with the announcement of The King of Iron Fist Tournament 6, he prepares for the tournament.

Ending Description: After defeating Azazel, Hwoarang removes the orb out of his chest and begins to carefully observe it. However, the orb tries to consume Hwoarang's soul and is about to transform him into a devil in process, with Hwoarang shouting "I'm...not like... him!". He manages to throw the orb to the floor and stomp on it, destroying it for good, preventing the orb from transforming him into another devil-like "that man". He then leaves.

Prologue Text: Hwoarang sees one man as his rival: Jin Kazama. Jin, CEO of the Mishima Zaibatsu, declared war against the world, and in the ensuing turmoil vanished suddenly, without a trace. Suspecting there is more to Jin's disappearance than meets the eye, Hwoarang vowed to track him down.

With only a shred of reliable information at hand, he headed to the Middle East. After a series of dead leads, Hwoarang heard word that a demon had appeared in a town. Without a second thought, he got on his motorcycle and hammered down there.

Ending Description: As Jin's devil powers subside, Hwoarang yells that it is not worth beating a monster like him. Suddenly, UN soldiers arrive and throw a grenade at them. Hwoarang saves Jin from the grenade but gets caught in the explosion himself and is knocked unconscious. As Jin flees with the soldiers in hot pursuit, Hwoarang tries to get up while covering his injured right eye, but collapses.

Other Appearances

Hwoarang is a playable character in the non-canonical Tekken Tag Tournament game. He retains his moveset from Tekken 3 with a few new ones to add. While being a non-canonical game in the series, Tekken Tag Tournament is looked at as the refined version of Tekken 3. In this game, like Tekken 3, he continues the grudge with Jin Kazama and Ogre in a certain rebellion his master Baek would not approve of.

Ending Description: He confronts Jin Kazama and complains while Jin stands there with indifference.

Hwoarang returns as a playable character in Tekken Tag Tournament 2. He retains his moveset from Tekken 6 with a few new ones added. His item move is a heel knife that provides a special K.O animation.

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Hwoarang Ending

Tekken Tag Tournament 2 Hwoarang's Ending.

Ending Description: Hwoarang challenges Jin to a motorcycle race, and prepares himself. As soon as the light in front of them turns blue, the two immediately move out and waste no time racing. After swerving through various cars and trucks, Jin uses a nearby ramp to get ahead of Hwoarang, with the latter increasing his speed in response. Soon Hwoarang unknowingly passes Lei Wulong, who immediately apprehends Hwoarang for speeding. Later while Hwoarang is trying to convince Lei that Jin was the speeder, the said speeder passes the two with his motorbike at normal speed.

Hwoarang appears in Tekken Card Tournament as a playable character. His cards focus on "morphing" an opponent's deck's statistics, which weakens the card and removes that card's effect. He can also morph his own into more powerful versions, but without the effect. His drawbacks are his slow draw speed, almost non-existent healing ability, and his tricky to activate power and quick draw boost abilities. He also has no parries, and little to no protective cards, making him a glass cannon in the long run that must focus on offense.
It's also noteworthy that he is one of the more underused characters, and is uncommonly seen in online tournaments and matches. He is safe for all skill levels to use. He is one of the most controversial characters since a lot of players find his card morph overpowered and annoying as well as able to be abused in solo and tag decks, which had to be adjusted quite a few times when the game developers had to adjust tag costs since players opted to make decks that could abuse this ability.

Gameplay

Despite having a flashy and agile moveset, Hwoarang’s speed is quite average. He makes it up with a powerful set of kicks, rivaled only by Baek in terms of damage and range. His kicks are also relatively safe to perform punishment-wise, the only major drawback being their vulnerability to counters.

His punches are best used as quick pokes or something to keep the opponent mid-air during juggles. The raw damage of Hwoarang’s punches is minimal and they should be only used with good strategic planning.

Hwoarang is one of the most complex characters in the series due to his multiple stance transitions and massive movelist, making him not very beginner-friendly. Hwoarang specializes in a very aggressive playing style and many of his moves leave him in an advantageous state, even on block. Having poor defensive capabilities, he is best-suited in applying constant pressure to the opponent.

Fighting Style

Moves

Quotes

Character Relationships

Baek Doo San - His Taekwondo teacher and master. Baek is the only person in which Hwoarang does not address him with his usually cocky and brash attitude and respects him greatly.

Jin Kazama - Hwoarang is constantly attempting to pick a fight with Jin and regards him as his rival. Jin does not return this regard and usually sees him as an interference. Hwoarang managed to defeat Jin in Tekken 5, but Jin transformed into his devil form and nearly killed Hwoarang. They both fought each other again in Tekken 7 while Jin is in his devil form. Hwoarang also saved Jin from a grenade that came from one of the UN soldiers but ended up losing his eye as a result while Jin escapes.

Steve Fox - Fought each other in Tekken 5's intro. Steve is also his partner in Street Fighter X Tekken.

Trivia

General:

He bears the nickname, Blood Talon, and the pseudonym 'BoB' (not to be confused with Robert Richards, the character introduced in Tekken 6, who is more commonly called Bob), allegedly because western gamers have difficulty in writing his name correctly. Another theory is that it is derived from the pre-release Tekken 3 art by Namco where he was seen on a motorcycle, but without any name given, he became known simply as Boy on Bike.

He (along with Jin and Steve) is currently the youngest human male character in the series.

Hwoarang can be seen practicing Hwarang-Tul of I.T.F. Taekwondo in Tekken 3's demonstration video[9], and many of his win animations in the series are taken from various Tul (Korean for Kata) from the I.T.F. Taekwondo style.

A lot of fans, especially those of European and American origin have trouble pronouncing Hwoarang's name; canonically, it is pronounced "Hwa-rang", common mispronunciations include "Whore-ang" and "How-rang". Somehow, his name ended up consistently mispronounced as the latter in Street Fighter x Tekken.

Hwoarang's name is based on the Hwarang, a group of elite male youth in Silla, an ancient Korean Kingdom. While the literal translation of this means "Flower Boy".

Hwoarang has the most win animations in Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection and Tekken 6, with a total of ten win animations each. However, one of his win animations would only show up after defeating Jinpachi Mishima in Tekken 5: Dark Resurrection, which is (obviously) not the case in Tekken 6.

Hwoarang is the only person to win an official tournament match against Jin Kazama.

Hwoarang's Stage 7 sub-boss is Ogre. If Ogre is not yet unlocked, then it is Jin. If both Ogre and Jin are not available, then it is Baek

There is a glitch where if Baek performs his tag throw with Hwoarang, but only the first part of the throw is enough to actually knock the opponent out, then Baek will remain, but the opponent's body will still act as if Hwoarang, who never came out, is still performing his part of the throw. This glitch remained in the Playstation 2 console version of the game.

Hwoarang is seen out of his two stereotypical costumes (biker and Taekwondo outfits) for the first time.

In his ending, Hwoarang speaks English when he confronts Jin for a fight, with Jin responding in English as well. This is the only time either speak English (with the exception of the non-canonical Street Fighter X Tekken game); the rest of the time, they only speak Korean and Japanese, respectively.

In the arcade, and Asian console versions, Hwoarang speaks either Japanese or English in his intro and win quotes.[7] In the western localizations, he speaks Korean instead, albeit not having matching lip-sync.

He and Lei Wulong have recorded voice lines, some of which are unused, in both Japanese and English in the arcade version.[10]

In the opening of Tekken 5, Steve Fox and Hwoarang can be seen fighting each other, they were later announced as partners for Street Fighter X Tekken, and they also received a special tag throw in Tekken Tag Tournament 2.

The Heihachi trophy that was seen in Hwoarang's Tekken 3 ending is available as a customizable item for him in Tekken 5.

Hwoarang's sub-bosses are Baek Doo San and Jin Kazama.

Hwoarang is one of the few characters in Tekken 5 that do not fight Devil Jin in the 8th battle of Story Mode.

In one of his win animations he can be seen performing the first three moves from the 'Won-Hyo' tul.

His Talon Sky Rocket deals 27 damage instead of 25.

His win animation (where he sits on his downed opponent while he/she is trying to get up) had one removed feature; unlike in Tekken 4 and 5, his downed opponent no longer makes a grunt while being sat on.

Hwoarang's Super Art is the "Heel Explosion Combo" where he kicks and heel drop to his opponent and goes in mid air for a devastating heel kick.

He shares the same quotes with his rival Jin during the first attack on his opponents and misses one of his throws and his quotes are "Just getting stand still...?" and "What?!" In Jin's quote from his first attack, however is "Just getting stand there...?"

Being in a game created by Capcom, Hwoarang does not speak Korean in this game, instead he speaks either English or Japanese like most characters in the game.

Hwoarang makes nicknames to most male characters as "Geezer". Although the slang word of "geezer" means "dude" in the United Kingdom while in the United States it means old and cranky. Oddly enough his official tag partner, Steve is from United Kingdom.

Hwoarang is one of the three Tekken characters that use their Player 2 outfit instead of their Player 1 outfit. The other two are Asuka and Lili.

Hwoarang has a special tag throw with Baek and Steve where Hwoarang performs a "Human Cannonball" to push his opponent to Baek who promptly responds by kicking the opponent or Steve who will then jab the opponent then both of them attack the opponent simultaneously.

He has special win pose with Baek Doo San and Devil Jin and two special win poses with Jin Kazama.

His Taekwondo uniform has been incorrectly named as "Karate uniform" in the customization mode.

He can be customized to resemble manga character Naruto Uzumaki in his Shippuden attire.

Hwoarang's item move replaces his "Falcon Dice Kick" if the opponent is low enough to be knocked out. Instead of the standard throw, Hwoarang will launch a barrage of kicks before sending the opponent flying with a Skyrocket.

Hwoarang has a new pre-fight animation where he sits on his motorcycle as he smirks.

Hwoarang's Rage Art requires him to be in his Flamingo Stance in order to execute it. It is safe on block as a result.

Hwoarang received Baek's Flamingo Rocket and Double Claymore, which the latter can also be executed during Left Flamingo.

Hwoarang regained his Right Nose Bleeder in this game. It was removed from Tekken 6 to make way for Middle Claymore, which got its command changed to d/f+4 in Tekken 7.

The notation for Power Blast in this game was changed from f+1+4 to 1+4 (during Left Flamingo).

In Fated Retribution, Hwoarang is the only character to have more than 1 Rage Drive. (Although both Steve Fox and the new character Negan also now have multiple Rage Drives in Season 2.)

His first rage drive is an i12 frame unseeable low followed by a fast toe kick, and ends with a right-leg version of Flying Nerichagi. It is primarily used as a wall combo ender or pressure. If the last hit was not delayed, it is not possible to interrupt the move.

His second rage drive is based on the Ogres' Twin Hell Axle, and gives a second screw. On certain stages, wall to wall combos are possible. It is also primarily used when breaking all four breakable walls in the Howard Estate stage. It is impossible to duck the move.

He, King, Bryan, & Steve are the only characters who are not wearing their new main outfits in their Character Episodes.

He can be customized to resemble Kanji Tatsumi from Persona 4.

His item move involves him summoning a mini biker to crash into the opponent.

Other:

Even though Hwoarang does not appear in Tekken: The Motion Picture, his picture can be seen near the beginning of the movie along with some other fighters' pictures.

A character named "Iron Surfer", played by Stephen Fung, in the Hong Kong Martial Arts movie "The Avenging Fist" bears a strong resemblance to Hwoarang, and the movie itself is known for its many allusions to Tekken. The resemblance to Hwoarang is both in looks and fighting style.